


searching for someone who knows how to say the words (we’ve carved into our palms with bloody fingernails)

by muad_dib



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Force Bond (Star Wars), Getting Together, M/M, Mandalorian!Jedi Obi-Wan, Mando'a Language (Star Wars), POV Anakin Skywalker, idiots to lovers, language kink if you squint, obikin, probably inappropriate uses of the Force, terms of endearment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-15 00:41:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29180451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/muad_dib/pseuds/muad_dib
Summary: Anakin’s in love with Obi-Wan, and he’s pretty sure it’s the worst thing that’s ever happened to him. Also, why does Obi-Wan keep using some Mando’a nickname for Anakin that he doesn’t understand?An AU where Obi-Wan is a Jedi but was born a Mandalorian. Anakin’s the one who grew up at the Jedi Temple; Obi-Wan wasn’t found until he was 14, after he had already sworn to follow the resol’nare.
Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 23
Kudos: 147





	searching for someone who knows how to say the words (we’ve carved into our palms with bloody fingernails)

**Author's Note:**

> Translations of all Huttese and Mando’a phrases are in the end notes. 
> 
> The fic starts when Anakin is knighted, then skips forward a few years and contains flashbacks to events in his early months as a Knight. 
> 
> Reference for quote in title: blog post by Rosie Leizrowice (source: https://www.rosieleizrowice.com/blog/hurts)
> 
> Thank you to IronPen and Sarah McCool for betaing!
> 
> Also thank you to everyone in the SW Conlang discord for enlightening discussions of Mando'a!

The worst part was the fear that Obi-Wan knew everything already. 

Of course Anakin was doing his best to hide it, and of course he had never heard so much of a whisper of a rumor around the Jedi Temple or the Coruscant gossip rags or anywhere else. (Of course he’d checked. Thoroughly.)

But he knew the limits of his own mental shields; knew that they tended to grow brittle when he was overly tired. Knew that they were thin as flimsi when he awoke from the nightmares that he would vehemently deny to Obi-Wan that he still had. 

He was a Jedi living with another Jedi, after all. There was always the danger that Obi-Wan had sensed the truth in one of those moments when his shields were down.

But a Jedi shouldn’t have attachments, and a relationship was absolutely forbidden to Jedi. 

Anakin was in love with Obi-Wan, and it was the worst thing to ever happen to him. 

\-- -- 

“By the right of the Council, by the will of the Force, Anakin Skywalker, rise, you may.” Master Yoda’s lightsaber extinguished with a snap-hiss, and Anakin didn’t move.

Anakin was pretty sure he had been holding his breath the entire time he knelt; sure that something would go wrong at the last moment and he wouldn’t be knighted after all, sure that everything he had hoped and worked for was about to come crashing down around him. But now at the age of nineteen, he was finally, _finally_ here. 

“Anakin? Breathe, Anakin!” That was Obi-Wan, and more than anything else the concern he felt pulsing down their bond in the Force brought him back to the present.

“What?” Anakin opened his eyes, suddenly dizzy, to see Master (no, _former_ Master, he had to remind himself) Obi-Wan holding out a hand to him. He reached out and took it, steadying himself and allowing a flash of gratitude to show through their bond as he rose to his feet. 

A Knight! It had been a long road, and in his lowest moments Anakin had never thought he would make it. There was something different about him, something fey and odd that his fellow younglings had never let him forget. None of them knew their home planets; the Jedi Temple was what they all remembered as their first home. 

_“Gar nari mando’kar, Anakiin,”_ Obi-Wan said quietly, and the emotion Anakin felt radiating from him through their bond was so unexpected and unlike Obi-Wan that he almost didn’t recognize it, but no...Pride. Obi-Wan was proud of him, very proud of him, if the un-Jedi-like lack of calm flooding his senses could be trusted. 

Everything got very loud after that and Anakin still felt somewhat dizzy from holding his breath; the Council chambers somehow seemed both smaller and larger than they usually were. Masters and their newly-Knighted former Padawans filled the room with the sounds of back-slapping and congratulations. 

Obi-Wan slung an arm over Anakin’s shoulders (and wasn’t that funny that he had to reach up to do it, it had only been in the last year or so that Anakin became the taller of the two) and steered him towards the door. 

“And now Anakin and I go to celebrate!” Obi-Wan announced, dashing all of Anakin’s hopes of a quiet escape from the room that was crammed with Masters and their newly-knighted former padawans. 

Quinlan Vos, possibly the most annoying Knight Anakin knew, winked at him. “What’s that involve, huh Kenobi?” 

“I must buy him a drink!” Obi-Wan announced. “A proud and long Mandalorian tradition!”

“You’re a Jedi, not a Mando,” Vos reminded him. 

Later Anakin would swear the temperature in the room dropped ten degrees. 

The thing nobody else understood about Obi-Wan, Anakin mused, was that he felt everything deeply, in spite of the implacable calm that he presented to the world. 

So when Vos unwittingly threw at him the worst insult that anyone could say to a Mandalorian, Obi-Wan, who Anakin knew considered himself equally both Jedi and Mandalorian, did not so much as move an eyebrow. Anakin felt the hot anger that boiled from Obi-Wan, but even in this his former Master had perfect control; the anger flowed only to their bond, not out to the general Force where any other Jedi could sense it. 

For all any of the rest of them knew, nothing Vos had said had affected Obi-Wan in the slightest, but Anakin knew. 

Anakin knew everything about Obi-Wan, he thought. Obi-Wan was unlike other Masters that way; he had never hidden his feelings from his padawan. He had let Anakin sense everything through their training bond in the Force, and if it had grown stronger than the usual Master-Padawan bond as a result, who knew about it? Nobody but Anakin ever sensed the extent of Master Kenobi’s emotions. 

Obi-Wan might not betray his anger, but Anakin was another story. 

“And you’re a Knight, not a master yet like Master Obi-Wan,” Anakin shot back, not bothering to try and dampen the irritation from his voice or in the Force. 

“Come, my Padaw-- Anakin. Let’s go,” Obi-Wan said, and a flash of warning down their bond accompanied his words. 

“Master? What did you say to me back there, when I was knighted?” Anakin’s curiosity finally bursting out after their third round of drinks.

Obi-Wan had brought them to a cantina Anakin had never been in before. They were the only ones wearing Jedi robes, and many of the others in the cantina wore armor and helmets that they did not remove. 

More than a few had greeted Obi-Wan with yells of “ _Oya!”_ when he and Anakin had walked in the door. 

“You have the right stuff, Anakin,” Obi-Wan translated, slamming his empty tankard down on the table for emphasis. “What it takes. You have that. I wanted you to hear it from me, not just from the Council. That I believe you have what it takes to be a Jedi Knight.” 

“...Oh.” Anakin blushed, he couldn’t help it. “Thank you, Master.” 

“You can call me Obi-Wan now, you know,” Obi-Wan said. 

“I’m just not in the habit yet,” Anakin demurred.

“Obi-Wan! _Oya! Gar hibir nari ijaat!”_ Another helmeted (Mandalorian, Anakin realized, and wow, had it really taken him that long to catch on? The drink must be affecting him more than he had realized) stranger approached them and slapped Obi-Wan on the back. 

“ _Vor’e, burc’ya!”_ Obi-Wan replied. 

It was clear to Anakin that though these armored Mandalorians were strangers to him, they weren’t to his master. 

“How do you know all these people, Master?” Anakin asked. 

“We drink together every week, if I’m on Coruscant,” Obi-Wan replied a little absently, waving as a new person walked into the cantina and a fresh chorus of _Oya!_ rose from the door. 

“Um...what’s happening now?” Anakin asked, feeling a little lost. “I’m realizing my vocabulary of mostly swears isn’t really up to this.” He wasn’t sure how to say it, or sure that he even should, but he also worried about their bond. 

Was it not just a few hours ago at his knighting ceremony that Anakin had taken an un-Jedi-like amount of pride in his (apparently false) idea that he knew Obi-Wan better than anyone? And now here was evidence that there was an entire side of Obi-Wan that he didn’t know, this side that went to the same cantina whenever he could to meet his drinking buddies. 

“They’re congratulating us,” Obi-Wan said, apparently oblivious to Anakin’s internal crisis, and with a smile at another raised glass and a shout of “ _Oya!”_ from across the room. “They’re congratulating you. They can see that your padawan braid is gone, so they know you have been made a Knight.” 

“What should I say back?” Anakin asked, taking another sip of his ale. 

“They don’t expect you to reply,” Obi-Wan said, then lowered his voice. “Our Mando’a language is...something we don’t share freely with outsiders. Although I have taught you some words, and consider you part of my _aliit_ , my family, there are...official ways of doing that. Of making someone part of one’s family. By Jedi standards we are _aliit_ , but not by Mandalorian.” 

“You do?” Anakin’s eyes were wide as saucers. “ _Aliit._ I like that word. Not a concept we really had as younglings in the temple.” 

He didn’t say the thought that followed, because he knew it was against the Jedi code. _Attachment is forbidden._ But Anakin couldn’t deny that he was attached to their training bond, and the constant reassurance that it provided of his relationship to Obi-Wan. 

\-- -- 

Obi-Wan had been sent on a mission alone, and it wasn’t fair. 

“Merit sending two Jedi, the situation does not,” Yoda had claimed, and Ki-Adi Mundi and Mace Windu, the only other members of the Council present, had nodded along, and Anakin smothered the flare of anger that threatened to rise at their words. 

He hated being separated from Obi-Wan. He missed the constant, comforting warmth of Obi-Wan’s presence in the Force when they were sent on separate assignments. He missed the minor emotions and thoughts that Obi-Wan sometimes sent down their bond in the Force when they were together.

His feelings about Obi-Wan were an attachment beyond what was permitted by the Jedi code; Anakin knew it better than anyone. The training bond he had shared with Obi-Wan during his days as a Padawan had never been formally severed. 

He had been hesitant to bring it up after his knighting, and the worry had simmered in his mind for two months until he had finally said something to Obi-Wan at a rare quiet moment during a siege on some planet whose name he wasn’t sure he ever learned about how strange it would be to no longer have that connection.

“We’ll see what happens to the bond, _cyar’ika_ ,” Obi-Wan had said, with a smile that made no sense to Anakin and a Mando’a word he didn’t recognize, but something about his former Master’s expression kept him from asking for a translation. And then the clankers had started shooting again, and there were urgent calls for backup from the clones, and the question was forgotten for the moment. 

Focusing on the rest of the battle, Anakin had never had the chance to ask Obi-Wan what he meant, and the bond remained in place. As the months went by, Anakin grew more and more protective over their bond, but he couldn’t shake the worry that Obi-Wan didn’t feel the same way about it. 

The bond was helpful in battle, to be sure. He doubted the Jedi Council knew the extent of it, though they benefited from it often enough by Obi-Wan and Anakin’s successes on the battlefields of the Clone Wars. But his greatest worry was that the Council would somehow force them to sever it. 

Maybe Obi-Wan hadn’t wanted to sever the training bond either, Anakin mused, sitting alone in their dark kitchen, a cup of the tea he didn’t drink (but Obi-Wan did) steaming on the table in front of him. Not that Obi-Wan was there to drink it. Obi-Wan was out risking his life on some planet whose name was apparently too classified for even his _vod_ to be allowed to know what it was. 

Not that Anakin knew exactly what _vod_ was supposed to mean either, but it seemed to come up a lot when Obi-Wan was talking about him to the other Jedi, and it seemed to always mean him. 

Especially when kriffing Quinlan Vos had mentioned to the council that Anakin was still living with Obi-Wan six months after being knighted. 

“Is it not right and proper for _vod_ to dwell together?” Obi-Wan had replied with an innocently puzzled look at Vos. 

“Great, here we go with more Mando nonsense,” Vos had said, rolling his eyes.

Anakin’s saber was lit and in his hand before he was consciously aware of having reached for it, and Master Fisto was eyeing them both with consternation. 

“Interfere we will not, if Master Obi-Wan’s custom this is,” Yoda said, in his typical voice that brooked no argument. 

“What an...unusual arrangement,” Vos had commented, winking at Anakin. 

And Anakin, standing there with his lightsaber lit in the middle of a conversation that he only half understood, had blushed, and he didn’t understand why he did that either. The whole thing was confusing. 

“I’m not moving out of my home,” he said, extinguishing his saber. There. That seemed safe to say. 

He hadn’t been sure where it was safe to look. Not at Vos, certainly, or he would be tempted to stab him. He didn’t want to meet Master Yoda’s or Master Fisto’s eyes either, though. There was that probably-illicit former training bond he was still hiding from them, after all. He didn’t want them to somehow sense it, now that he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about it. 

Obi-Wan was safe to look at, Anakin had decided. 

But unless his eyes had deceived him, the faintest blush had spread across his former Master’s nose. 

“It’s decided, then.” Obi-Wan said, turning from Vos to Anakin. “Come, _vod’cya_ , let us return to our training.” 

And they had returned to their training, and then that night had gone back to their shared quarters in the Jedi Temple, and after that no more mention was made to the Council of Anakin moving to quarters of his own. 

But he wondered, sometimes, what Obi-Wan had meant. Anakin would be the first to admit that his Mando’a was sparse, limited to a few phrases picked up here and there, mostly from Obi-Wan, but occasionally found in the Jedi Archives. 

The words he found in the archives were often in centuries-old records of conflicts between Mandalorians and the Jedi, and more often than not Anakin came away from those research sessions with a sense of unease. He wondered what those past Jedi would have thought about a Mandalorian Jedi. He was pretty sure it wouldn’t have been allowed, for someone to be both the way Master Obi-Wan seemed to be. He was definitely sure it wouldn’t have been allowed, for a Jedi to be in love with a Mandalorian, the way Anakin was.

Somehow, he never found the right moment to ask Obi-Wan about any of it.

\-- -- 

Obi-Wan should have been back by now. 

There were only so many days Anakin could spend tinkering with the broken droids he found in the Temple trash room before he got restless. (Okay, that was a lie. He could never tire of mechanical work. It was satisfying on a level he didn’t really understand to take a broken droid that had been destined to be incinerated and turn it into something not only functional but better than it had been before.) 

But he shouldn’t have had the time to do it, that was the point, he reminded himself, setting a spanner back on his work table. (And okay, this wasn’t really even his table, but it was a room in the lower levels of the Temple that was near enough to the trash room where they stored deactivated droids meant to be incinerated that it was easy to snag a few to work on without being noticed.) 

He set down his newest creation, a Separatist-style mouse droid that would now helpfully explode when the passphrase “Roger roger” was said, and stepped back, flipping the power switch on it with the Force. No doubt some of the fogies on the Council would disapprove of this use of the Force.... Obi-Wan wouldn’t disapprove, Anakin knew. And if he was honest with himself, that was the only Jedi Master whose opinion he cared about. 

Besides, Obi-Wan himself had done things with the Force that the Council would disapprove of, if they knew about them. 

Anakin had been afraid, the first time their Force bond had gone silent. 

A year after he was knighted, he had returned to their quarters, alarm singing through his veins when he realized that he couldn’t sense Obi-Wan through their bond. It wasn’t that he expected Obi-Wan to be there, but it was a place to look for any hint of where his former Master had gone. Because something was clearly very wrong - Obi-Wan had never shut down the bond intentionally before, and Anakin had thought he never would. 

He tried to ignore the visions of Obi-Wan captured, tortured by the Seppies. Obi-Wan mutilated by Dooku. Obi-Wan on a burning planet, lightsaber flashing as he dueled someone Anakin couldn’t see, above a lake of lava. The intensity of the visions frightened him, and he ran faster. 

Anakin didn’t know where to go, but he was prepared to search the far reaches of the Outer Rim and the depths of the Core until he found his Master. He shoved the door to their quarters open with the Force and ran inside. As it sometimes did when he was upset, things started happening in the Force before he formed any conscious thoughts about them: provisions started came sailing towards him from the kitchen, and his rucksack scooted across the floor from the living area to catch them. 

Someone groaned in the back room, and Anakin froze. 

Several ration bars plunked to the ground, and someone in the back room sighed in obvious frustration. 

Anakin knew that specific sigh of frustration very well. 

“Master?” Anakin couldn’t hide the relief from his voice.

“Yes, Anakin?” Obi-Wan’s voice was a little stern, now. And now their bond was Force-bright with Obi-Wan’s presence, and it was definitely him back there, in Obi-Wan’s bedroom. 

“I...I couldn’t sense you through the bond,” Anakin admitted. “I was afraid you’d been hurt.” 

“Oh, Anakin.” Obi-Wan emerged from the back bedroom, and joined Anakin in the living area. 

Something was still wrong, though, Anakin realized. The layers of the collar of Obi-Wan’s robes were slightly askew, and his belt was almost...no, it _was_ slightly off-center. It wasn’t like Obi-Wan to not have his robes in pristine regulation status at all times. He’d explained it to Anakin once - it was some kind of Mandalorian thing, part of something Obi-Wan had called the _resol’nare_. The robes were a stand-in for his armor, or something like that, and therefore had to be flawless at all times. Anakin hadn’t really been paying attention, because Obi-Wan had just changed his haircut at the time and that had been very distracting. 

“Master, what’s wrong?” Anakin’s concern flooded their bond. 

Obi-Wan must have realized how he looked, because he twitched a finger almost imperceptibly, and the collar of his robes straightened. 

“I was just...looking for a little privacy for a few moments,” Obi-Wan said, running a hand through his hair. Frustration leaked off of him into the bond. 

“You were--” He stopped before actually saying it, incredulous. 

And then something happened in the Force that Anakin had never felt before. Anakin felt an abrupt spinning sensation, as if he was being whirled around in a circle, and then he was staring at himself, as if he was standing right where Obi-Wan had been standing, and he felt so frustrated, but that made no sense. He tried to recall what he had been doing just before this, and instead of his memories of running through the hallways of the Temple to get to their quarters, he saw-- 

_Obi-Wan lying on his bed, back propped up with pillows. Hands resting at his sides as if he were meditating, senses extended in the Force, and pressure from the Force somewhere he had never…_

Anakin’s stomach flipped, and he realized what must be happening, and he was back in his own body, staring at Obi-Wan with wide eyes.

“ _Osik,_ ” Obi-Wan muttered. “That was exactly what I was trying to avoid you seeing. Our former training bond has grown much stronger over time.” That word, Anakin knew. _Osik_ had come up a lot when he first became Obi-Wan’s padawan. Anakin’s knowledge of Mando’a swears had almost rivalled his Huttese swears by the end of that first year.

“Did you--” Anakin wasn’t sure how to ask. 

“Experience the fear you felt down in your not-very-secret droid workshop when you realized you couldn’t sense me?” Obi-Wan said, an unreadable expression in his eyes. “Yes. I am sorry for causing you alarm, _vod’cya._ ” 

“It’s...fine, Master,” Anakin muttered, ignoring the Mando’a word he didn’t know in favor of attempting to escape the conversation quickly before it somehow got even more embarrassing than it already was. “I’m gonna go back to my droids.” He turned towards the door, but Obi-Wan caught his arm. 

“Anakin.” He turned, and Obi-Wan’s eyes were clear as crystal, intense as the lines of hyperspace. “I won’t dampen the bond like this again. I won’t worry you like this again.” 

“I...thank you, Master,” Anakin said. 

“Right. Your droids,” Obi-Wan said, releasing Anakin’s arm. “I won’t keep you.” 

It was a clear dismissal. Anakin left, and returned to his no-longer-secret droid workshop. 

So Anakin wasn’t the only one with secrets, wasn’t the only one who has used the Force in ways the Council definitely shouldn’t know about. He just wished he knew what it meant. For all his straightforwardness, his former Master could be bafflingly opaque when he wanted to be. 

\-- -- 

Nothing good ever came of being summoned by the Jedi Council. Anakin paused before opening the door to the council chambers, trying to get his thoughts under control, but it was pointless. He only hoped that if any of the masters tried to sift through the maelstrom of emotions swirling inside him, they were too overwhelmed to find anything that was truly important (or incriminating). 

“Knight Skywalker,” Yoda said, when Anakin entered the room. “Summoned you, we have, to reassure you that your former master Obi-Wan all right will be.” 

Well, that was unexpected. As usual, Mace and Ki-Adi Mundi were unreadable. Fisto was missing, and so was Obi-Wan. Plo Koon avoided his eyes.

“What? Obi-Wan’s in trouble?” Anakin didn’t bother to try to keep the panic from his voice. Why hadn’t he sensed it through their bond? Three years after being knighted, rather than being severed or fading on its own, it was stronger than ever. He should have sensed it! This would never have happened if the Council hadn’t separated them. 

Anakin let out a slow breath, willing his anger to dissipate. Anger now would not help Obi-Wan.

“To the halls of healing, he has been taken,” Yoda said. 

“But he needs rest. For now we do not permit you to see him,” Mundi added, and Anakin froze, a hand on the door. “We are sending you to the Kardoa system, along with the Open Circle Fleet, to reinforce Knight Vos and Master Fisto.”

“ _Chess ko, sleemo_ ,” Anakin spit at him, and turned and ran. He wasn’t going anywhere with Vos, that sleemo, until he knew Obi-Wan was all right. 

It wasn’t often that he spoke Huttese anymore, and the longer he spent as a Jedi the less often he found himself reaching for it. These days if he spoke anything other than Basic, it was probably Mando’a, with Obi-Wan. 

Obi-Wan. Shaking his head, Anakin ran for the infirmary to find him. 

The plan was that there was no plan. It wasn’t like the Halls of Healing were usually heavily guarded anyway. They were busier these days, with the war, but Anakin slowed his steps to a walk by the time he got close and nobody noticed one more Jedi slipping in among those already coming and going. 

Anakin hoped to find Obi-Wan at the beds nearest the entrance; those were where the least wounded Jedi would be resting, those who were about to leave for their own quarters. 

But there were few Jedi there; only a trio of Padawans sitting and gossipping at the end of a row of unoccupied beds.

His heart sinking, he made his way farther back, towards the more secluded areas of the halls, where the more seriously wounded Jedi recovered in greater privacy from the general hullabaloo of the Temple. 

He ran now, reaching out his senses with the Force and looking for that sun-bright signature that meant Obi-Wan, that meant Master, that meant _home._ He ran through the hall of tiny rooms, extending tendrils of thought and Force-awareness to each door that he passed, growing more and more concerned at each one what didn’t hold Obi-Wan.

But Obi-Wan wasn’t in any of the rooms. 

“Knight Skywalker,” said a Kaminoan Jedi he didn’t recognize, a hand heavy on his shoulder, “this area is not open for visitors.” 

“Where is Master Kenobi?” Anakin demanded, swallowing the insults that rose with his frustration. This Jedi wasn’t trying to keep him from Obi-Wan, he reminded himself. At least, not yet. Patience. 

“Master Kenobi is no longer with us,” the healer said. 

Anakin’s vision whited out. His veins were full of ice, or maybe laser fire or lead or something else he couldn’t identify; everything was too heavy and too light all at once because this fundamentally could not be true - Obi-Wan could not be-- Anakin would have sensed it, he must have--

Some sense of warning tingled at the back of his mind, but Anakin didn’t want warnings just now, didn’t care about anything except-- 

Forgetting the lightsaber at his belt, he took a swing at the healer, fist connecting with the man’s face. “What the kark?” The other Jedi yelled, stumbling backwards. “Leave me the kriff alone!” 

“What Healer Se was attempting to tell you, Knight Skywalker, is that Master Kenobi has left the halls of healing to recuperate in his own quarters,” Vokara Che said, inserting himself smoothly between Anakin and Healer Se. 

“That’s not what you made it sound like,” Anakin muttered, with a glare at Healer Se, struggling to calm the fury that had risen within him. 

“If that is all, Knights, I suggest you both go about your business and stop making a scene. Beings are trying to rest.” Master Che did not hide his displeasure in the Force, and Anakin winced. 

“Yes, Master Che,” he said. “I’ll just be going.” He took a deep breath, visualizing his anger evaporating into the Force until his pounding heart calmed. 

_Time to get out of here and actually find Obi-Wan,_ he thought, edging towards the door, before someone who knew he was supposed to be on a star destroyer headed for Kardoa noticed his presence. 

Obi-Wan had to be back at their quarters, Anakin reasoned. The council had made it sound like he was worse off than Master Che had, but beyond that, Anakin knew his former Master, and knew he liked his peace and quiet when he could get it. If he was injured, he would want to recover in the privacy and quiet of their own quarters if he possibly could. 

At least, that was what Anakin tried to convince himself to drive away the old fear (Obi-Wan dead, Obi-Wan falling into a lake of boiling rock, Obi-Wan electrocuted by Force lightning while Anakin watched helplessly) that something unthinkable had happened to Obi-Wan. 

Obi-Wan’s presence in the Force flickered brighter and brighter the closer Anakin got to their quarters, but he couldn’t trust it until he saw the flash of Obi-Wan’s copper hair over the side of the sofa, and something softened, eased in his mind. 

Obi-Wan was asleep, stretched out on the long gray sofa, back to the room, head resting on a pillow. In the silence of their quarters, Anakin could hear his breathing, and finally, finally believed that everything would be all right. 

He felt more than saw Obi-Wan stirring, waking slightly, as the sense of his presence in their bond solidified into something more like the Obi-Wan that Anakin was used to. 

“Hello there, _vod’cya_ ,” Obi-Wan said, his voice fond but rough from sleep. 

It was pointless to try to hide the rush of affection and (yes, he might as well admit it to himself, since there was almost no hiding it in the Force anymore, Anakin realized) love that flooded their bond at Obi-Wan’s words. 

_“Ni echoy’yc par gar, Rami’kad,”_ Anakin said, and if he sounded a little petulant, why not let Obi-Wan see that? It had been hard with him away and harder knowing that he was wounded and that Anakin couldn’t find him. 

Sometimes it was easier to say things to Obi-Wan in Mando’a, to try to show him the depth of his feelings for his former Master in a language that wasn’t tied to a code that forbade that kind of attachment. Mandalorians were encouraged to love, Anakin knew. He only hoped that in this regard, Obi-Wan was more Mandalorian than he was Jedi. 

“I am sorry, _ni vod’cya_ ,” Obi-Wan said. “I tried to come back to you as fast as I could. I was delayed…” His voice trailed off, and Anakin realized he was asleep again. 

Maybe that was for the best. Anakin didn’t know if he was ready to risk everything to find out just yet. He settled at the edge of the sofa at Obi-Wan’s feet, crossing his legs and sitting in his former Master’s favorite position for meditation. For once, he knew he needed that more than sleep. 

\-- -- 

The Council had promised them a month of leave once they took Felucia from the Separatists, and Anakin was determined to make it count. They had been fighting too long, had been avoiding saying what he needed to say for too long until he was afraid the words would burst out of him at any moment. He just needed to find the right moment. 

He had to say it in Mando’a, Anakin decided, because then there could be no possible confusion, no possible misunderstanding. Something in him resisted making a declaration of his love for his former Master in Basic, the language that in his mind was too tied to his upbringing and training as a Jedi Knight. His commitment to the Jedi Code wouldn’t allow it. 

But Mando’a, the language of Obi-Wan’s heart, and, as Anakin hoped, the language that he was now proficient enough in to reach him with his deepest, most desperate hopes: Mando’a would save him. 

If he could make himself wait until the right moment to say it, and not just blurt out his most fragile hopes and dreams during the middle of a battle.

The front lines were quiet, for the time being. The clone troopers had fallen back to take the injured back to the medical transport ships, and the two Jedi generals of the Open Circle Fleet knelt shoulder to shoulder behind a large boulder. 

His senses sharpened by the Force, Anakin could hear the shuffle-clank sounds of the droid army advancing. At the last survey, they had been about a klick away.

“They’re going to have to pass through that narrow canyon to get to us,” Obi-Wan pointed out. “If we can cause a rock avalanche when most of the droid army is inside the canyon, we stand a much better chance of delaying them until the clones can get the wounded safely to the transports.” 

“But there isn’t any loose rock on the canyon wall,” Anakin pointed out.

“No, one of us will have to go up there and cut at it with a lightsaber. We won’t be able to pull it down from here with the Force, unfortunately,” Obi-Wan agreed. 

“I’ll take the droids,” Anakin declared, starting to rise. 

“No.” Obi-Wan’s voice was quiet but firm. “I cannot allow you to take that risk, _vod’cya._ ” 

“I’ll be fine, Master,” Anakin complained. “You know I can handle a bunch of droids.” 

“If I were to fail with the avalanche…” Obi-Wan shook his head. “Let me take the droids.” 

It was a solid plan, Anakin knew; to tempt them into the cramped space by leaving it seemingly defended by only a solitary Jedi. The droids would certainly fall for it; they weren’t intelligent enough to recognize a trap far enough in advance to avoid falling into it. Most of the droids should be destroyed by the rockfall, but Anakin still didn’t like the idea of Obi-Wan standing alone against an entire droid battalion. 

Unfortunately, Obi-Wan didn’t like the idea of _Anakin_ standing alone against an entire droid battalion, and Obi-Wan technically outranked him. 

“Yes, Master,” Anakin said, recognizing that there was going to be no changing Obi-Wan’s mind. He let his reluctance show briefly through their bond, only long enough to hopefully make Obi-Wan understand how much he disliked this plan, disliked putting Obi-Wan in the line of fire while he was safe on the cliff wall. 

Anakin turned to leave, but--

Something, maybe a whisper of the Force, stopped him. _Tell him. Tell him now._

Anakin looked down at Obi-Wan, still kneeling in the dust, leaning around the side of the boulder to look out at the canyon’s opening. 

“I’ll stand there, I think,” he said, sending a flash of an image through their bond to Anakin. “That position is far enough from the canyon opening that the rocks should miss me, and will close enough that I can stop the remaining droids before they make it through to the clones. 

“Master, I--” Anakin stopped, frustrated. This wasn’t how he wanted to do it. Not in Basic. Not in the language of their shared Jedi vows to avoid attachment, to avoid the very thing that Anakin was about to confess. 

No, it had to be in Mando’a or he would not say it. He would not allow himself to say this the wrong way. There might not be another chance. 

“Yes, Anakin?” Obi-Wan sounded genuinely curious, as if he hadn’t sensed Anakin’s intentions through the bond. 

“ _Ke’me’dinui nuhur ti ni, ni vod’cya,”_ Anakin said, swallowing his fear. This was it. If Obi-Wan didn’t feel the same, at least now he would know for certain.

No, he refused to even think about it. Anakin had to be right about what that final word meant. He had checked his translation with the Archives too many times to be wrong now. This was how he had decided to tell Obi-Wan how he felt: using the word that he had heard Obi-Wan himself use for Anakin so many times over the past years. 

He had thought about it, meditated on it, for weeks now. Ever since he had been knighted, Obi-Wan had been calling him _vod’cya_ , and Anakin was pretty sure now that he knew what it meant. 

And if he was right -- if he had been so blind for so long to what his former Master had been telling him, sometimes several times a day--- 

Well, he was fixing it now. He was telling him now. 

But he couldn’t wait for Obi-Wan’s reply: he had a platoon of droids to destroy. He turned and ran out from their position behind the boulder to the edge of the canyon wall. Using the Force to get some extra height on his jump, he found handholds and footholds on the wall and started to climb. 

Eventually he made it to an outcropping of rock above the narrow canyon that the droid army would have to pass through. 

At the top of the wall, Anakin looked down, waiting as Obi-Wan moved into position a few paces off from where the cliffs petered out.

Obi-Wan stood at the opening of the narrow passage through the rock, his lightsaber lit and held in the opening guard position of _Soresu_ , while Anakin was tasked with creating the rock avalanche from the cliff walls above that should crush most of the droids before they reached his master. 

He didn’t launch the rocks right away. Obi-Wan cut a familiar figure, standing against the droids with his saber lit, his armor already dusty from the debris of battle. Anakin smirked; he couldn’t help it. Those droids had no idea what was coming. Even without his avalanche, even a hundred droids didn’t stand a chance against Obi-Wan. 

If everything went perfectly, Obi-Wan should not have to deal with anywhere near that number; only those at the front of the group who would have already passed the avalanche point when Anakin set the rocks in motion. 

_“Oya, Rami'kad,”_ Anakin sent through their bond. Igniting his lightsaber, he chopped at the rock with small cuts, trying to loosen the rock near the top of the canyon wall and closed his eyes. He sensed the point where the rock wall was weakest, and reached out with the Force to push at it. 

The wall crumbled. There was no way to do this without also destabilizing the rock he was standing on, so Anakin allowed himself to fall with it, using the Force to nudge his momentum a little so that he could jump from rock to rock, slowing a little with each leap until he made it to the ground. 

Boulders fell to the droid army below, crushing most of the main force. 

He caught a few brief scenes of Obi-Wan, his lightsaber blazing, dispatching the remaining droids with ease, and felt a flash of pride at his former master.

Anakin picked his way over the fallen rocks and smashed droids until he stood face to face with a grinning Obi-Wan. 

“We did it, _vod’cya!_ The droids are all destroyed and the clones must have gotten back to the transports by now,” Anakin said.

“Anakin! You keep saying that, but do you know what it means?” Obi-Wan’s face was neutral, but Anakin sensed his caution through the bond. 

“You call me _vod’cya_ all the time,” Anakin said, letting his indignation show through their bond in the Force, and then because he had to be absolutely sure, could not leave something as important as this to guesswork, added “ _Ni suvari. Ni kartayli bic sosol gar, Rami’kad.”_

 _“Ni cyar’ika,”_ Obi-Wan breathed, and kissed him. 

**Author's Note:**

> Whoops my hand slipped and there’s a lotr reference in my star wars fic
> 
> Does Quinlan Vos know Obi-Wan and Anakin are pining after each other? Is he trying to push them together faster, or just jealous - why does Master Kenobi get to live with his bf when Vos has to constantly sneak his one-night stands into the temple? Let me know in the comments :D
> 
> And about that cantina scene...look, I am aware that Mandalorians and Jedi do not get along. HOW E V E R I have this idea that the Mandalorians on Coruscant would kind of have a soft spot for Obi-Wan, since he comes from that background and seems to have found a way to incorporate his Mandalorian beliefs into his Jedi practice, and I think they would respect that. And that also once someone overheard Obi-Wan’s baby padawan (see, he is practicing bajur, they remind each other) mutter haar’chak when he accidentally walked into a pole or something, and just collectively decided that nope, actually that is freaking adorable, we stan one (1) jetii padawan. 
> 
> Translations from Huttese and Mando’a, in order of appearance in the fic: 
> 
> [Mando’a] Obi-Wan’s comment to Anakin when he is knighted: Gar nari mando’kar, Anakiin. Tr. “You have the right stuff, Anakin.” This is not a misspelling of Anakin’s name, but rather an attempt to follow the convention of how Mandalorians spell Basic words such as Jedi that have that single “i” sound. 
> 
> [Mando’a] Congratulatory comments to Obi-Wan and Anakin at the Mandalorian cantina: Oya! Tr. “Cheers!” 
> 
> [Mando’a] Longer congratulatory comment to Obi-Wan at the Mandalorian cantina: Oya! Gar hibir nari ijaat! Tr. “Cheers! Your student has honor!”
> 
> [Mando’a] Obi-Wan’s reply to the above comment: Vor’e, burc’ya! Tr. “Thanks, friend!” (informal)
> 
> [Mando’a] Obi-Wan’s comments to Anakin at the Mandalorian cantina: aliit. Tr. “family/clan” 
> 
> [Mando’a] Obi-Wan’s nickname for Anakin while discussing the bond: cyar’ika. Tr. “sweetheart”. 
> 
> [Mando’a] Term that Obi-Wan calls Anakin several times throughout the fic: vod, vod’ya. Tr. “partner (could refer to a platonic/brotherly or romantic love)”, “partner (romantic connotation)”
> 
> [Huttese] Anakin’s parting comment to the Jedi Council: Chess ko, sleemo tr. “Watch out, slimeball.” 
> 
> [Mando’a] Anakin’s comment to Obi-Wan when he finally finds him: Ni echoy’yc par gar, Rami’kad tr. “I grieved for/searched for you, master”. Note: I added the apostrophe before the last syllable of Rami’kad to make pronunciation more clear, though it is not strictly correct.
> 
> [Mando’a] Anakin’s comment to Obi-Wan where he takes a big risk: Ke’me’dinui nuhur ti ni, ni vod’cya tr. “Don’t have all the fun without me, my love” (lit. “share the fun with me, my love”)
> 
> [Mando’a] Anakin’s comment before launching the avalanche: Oya, Rami’kad! Tr. “Cheers, Master!”. (lit. Oya: various, including “stay alive”, “cheers”, “let’s hunt”, “hoorah!”, always positive and triumphant) 
> 
> [Mando’a] Anakin getting a little salty and a little flirty after the battle: Ni suvari. Ni kartayli bic sosol gar, Rami’kad. tr. “I know what it means and I mean it the same way you do, Master.” (lit. “I know. I understand it the same way you do, Master.”) 
> 
> [Mando’a] Obi-Wan’s final comment to Anakin: Ni cyar’ika tr. “My sweetheart.” 
> 
> \--  
> Thanks for reading! Leave a comment and tell me what you think!


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